Former presidential adviser Wu Li-pei (吳澧培), who was found not guilty in a money-laundering case, yesterday filed lawsuits against two prosecutors and two judges for what he called their abuse of judicial powers and political persecution.
Accompanied by his lawyers, Wu filed lawsuits against former Special Investigation Division (SID) prosecutors Chen Yun-nan (陳雲南) and Tsai Tsun-hsi (蔡宗熙) for malicious prosecution and judges Tsai Shou-hsun (蔡守訓) and Lee Ying-hao (李英豪) for malicious accusation.
“The lawsuits may not end up with the results I want, but it’s imperative for me to stand up against the prosecutorial abuse and political persecution after the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) return to power in 2008,” Wu told a press conference before filing the lawsuits at the Taipei District Court.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
The former presidential adviser said that he was subpoenaed as a witness in another case, but ended up being indicted on money-laundering charges “simply because the prosecutors said I had a close relationship with former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).”
The prosecutors appealed the case without any new evidence until “a judge with a conscience” cleared the charges against him in October 2011, three years after he was indicted, Wu said.
“Those who abused their judicial power should be held accountable,” he said.
The lawsuits were part of an effort by a group of self-proclaimed “judicial victims,” who said they were victims of political persecution aimed at former officials of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration, to highlight the necessity of judicial reform.
There have been at least 14 cases in which one or more former officials in the DPP administration were charged with corruption, but were later found not guilty, the group said.
The group has named 17 prosecutors in five cases so far and said they would continue to file lawsuits in the coming weeks.
Former DPP legislator Wu Ming-min (吳明敏) filed lawsuits accusing three investigators in the Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau of subornation of perjury last week in Taichung and former Tainan mayor Hsu Tain-tsair (許添財), who has been found not guilty in a corruption case, is scheduled to file a similar lawsuit on April 1.
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